One of the goals I have set myself this year is to rebuild lung function. At the moment my lung function sits on 43% and when you consider that 85+ percent would be considered normal for my age group you can see I have a bit of work to do. When I was first diagnosed with lung disease 7 years ago my lung function was 72%. Frequent infections have certainly taken their toll. I don’t know how much lung function it is possible for me to regain, but I have an open mind and have hope in possibilities. I won’t be setting an end goal or a set time frame but hope to document my progress intermittently over the coming year. I’ll be experimenting with exercise and some mind techniques to see what I can achieve. I’ll be recording my lung function every 3 weeks with a peak flow device, and then will include my lung function results from my clinic visits that I have done approximately every 4-6 weeks. I’ve decided to start with some mind techniques initially. I’m lucky enough to have a life coach who is teaching me various mind techniques. About a month ago we started with a session to help clear an issue that could be holding me back in terms of lung health and then I was required to come up with some affirmations to help me go forward. I was required to write out the affirmations and send them to her everyday for a month. I also had to write the affirmations out on a card and carry them around with me and read them intermittently through the day. I routinely did 15  minutes of meditation most days as well.  I’m quite amazed at the progress I’ve made already. One of my first affirmations related to living and not just existing. You see for the past few months I was couch bound due to a heavy cold and I literally felt like my life had come to a stand still. I was  existing rather than living. Now I’m pleased to report I feel I am living again. Woohoo! I am really enjoying the accountability of working with a life coach and she provides me with so much encouragement. I feel truly blessed to have this opportunity to learn from someone who has a true gift.

This month’s affirmation relates to having healthy lungs that function properly so it will be exciting to see how it goes. This will inevitably continue to be a part of my affirmations going forward. As I mentioned I’m going into this with an open mind and a belief that I will get results because I believe in the process. Here is a couple of the affirmations I have included for this month.

My peak flow measurement which is the amount of air I can force out of my lungs in one all out effort is  310 litres/min. I will be recording the best of 3 test measurements each time I record my peak flow  The normal range for someone of my age and height is about 440 litres/min. My lung function was 43% when last measured in December 2016. I will be recording my FEV1% score which is a measure of how much air I can forcefully exhale in the first second of a breath. I will be exercising throughout the entire process, but at this stage won’t be making any changes to my current program that consists of 20 minutes of continuous cardiovascular exercise.  e.g. walking

I don’t know about you but I have neither a love or hate relationship with exercise. I’m somewhere in between. All I know is I usually feel better for doing it. I didn’t always feel this way. I once lived and breathed exercise. It was my career. I was an exercise scientist, spruiking the benefits of exercise to all my clients. I loved it and practised what I preached. I felt like it was my calling. Then seven years ago it all changed. I got diagnosed with a lung disease and exercise suddenly became a chore. The shoe was on the other foot. I began to understand some of the obstacles my clients used to talk about in regard to exercise because I was facing some of those same challenges myself. Exercise became a real effort, but I knew it was something I had to continue with because my health depended on it. I learnt how hard it can be to get back the exercise habit when you’ve had a break from it for a while. Dealing with regular chest infections meant I was often falling off the exercise wagon and having to find my way back step by step. You know what they say though, “through adversity comes some of the greatest lessons”. I totally agree with that. If I were to pick out one thing that has helped me the most it’s the realisation that I had to make exercise a “non negotiable” Much like brushing my hair or doing my teeth I treat exercise as something that I automatically do as part of my day. I remember shortly after I was diagnosed rebelling against doing what I should be doing. I went a day without exercise and it was an awful day. My energy levels were terrible and my lungs were so congested I coughed so much more than usual. From this moment onwards exercise was a no brainer.

Exercise is a part of my life. Don’t get me wrong I wake up most mornings and momentarily think I don’t feel like doing it, but I just get on with it. I can’t rely on motivation to get me through because that seems to fluctuate from day to day. So I find having a routine time of  the day to exercise helpful. If I can’t exercise at my usual time due to some other commitment then I build it into another part of the day. Today for instance I was all out of whack. I couldn’t exercise at my usual time of 9am so I decided to break my exercise routine into two blocks of 15 minutes instead of one block of 30. There is plenty of evidence to support smaller blocks of exercise anyway. In fact I saw an interesting study done on the benefits of 6 minutes per week. Here’s the link. http://www.abc.net.au/catalyst/stories/4319131.htm  It’s worth a look as it is considered quite a reputable study. However I will say I don’t believe there is one exercise plan to fit all. It’s about what works for you. I do however believe there are a number of key components that make up an ideal exercise program. These include flexibility, strength, and cardiovascular endurance. My plan consists of a combination of walking or an indoor circuit, weights and stretching. If I have a break from exercise, usually caused by a flare up with my health I start small when I resume my plan. I may start with blocks of 5 minutes of exercise and build up from there, until I’m doing 30 minutes of exercise most days of the week. I intermittently review what I’m doing so I don’t get bored and I don’t get stuck in an exercise plateau. Sometimes it’s about making one small change that can make all the difference. I’m a bit of a fan of interval training to build fitness. I still do some steady state training which is continuous e.g. walking for 20 minutes at a set pace but on some days I mix it up with some short bursts of high intensity exercise e.g. 1 minute and then recover for a minute before starting another interval. I find it rebuilds my fitness quicker than the continuous steady state training.

Finally, having some kind of accountability is a huge asset. I have a team of allied health professionals that I’m accountable to at least each month and let’s just say they leave no stone unturned when it comes to my health. Having someone to report into helps keep me on track.

So if you’re starting out with exercise or finding it hard to regain the exercise habit I’d say the following.

• Set up a plan that is realistic and adaptable
• Try making exercise a non-negotiable
• Set up some kind of accountability
• Enjoyment is a bonus – as long as it’s sustainable you should be right!

Best wishes with maintaining the exercise habit. Just remember you are not alone. Everyone on the planet has to find some way to exercise.